Two Sisters Report 'Fireballs' Over DC

Depiction- "Lights over DC" by SW/LITS

Two sisters report seeing "balls of light" moving in a rapid and erratic circular pattern. 

Here is that unedited report, as it was submitted to MUFON.


MUFON Case #  30028
Date:    2004-05-21
Time:    22:42
Location:    District Of Columbia
Shape:    Fireball
Vallee Index:    CE3

Report:
I lay down on my left side facing the large panoramic windows in my bedroom. Even with my very impaired vision, I immediately became aware of some lights moving in the sky in a way I'd never seen before. I immediately sat up, retrieved my glasses from the night table, and put them on. Outside my window and over Rock Creek Park and a large residential building across the street, balls of light were moving rapidly and a bit jerkily in an oval-shaped counterclockwise pattern.

It's difficult to say exactly how many there were, but I believe that four individual lights would be a good estimate. After watching them for a stunned minute or two, I got out of bed, and went next door to get my sister. Together we stood at the window and watched this light show for approximately five minutes. Towards the end, the lights seemed to simply fade away through the heavy cloud cover until there was only one left. That light eventually faded as well. I did not look at the clock again until after my sister left. The time was 10:58.

Though I've called them "balls" of light, they weren't perfectly spherical. There was no hard edge to them, though I do believe there was a brighter intensity at the center of each. During the entire event, they kept moving in the same circular pattern – very, very rapidly and very, very erratically, Though pinpointing precisely where they were is tough, I recall that my sister and I both stooped a bit to get a full view of the "show". (I usually have the blinds in my bedroom about 1/3 of the way down.) I forgot until Saturday evening when I turned on my television and my TiVo that I had recorded during the exact time of the event. Because I'm very sure that it was the second burst of static that caused me to turn off the television, I can time the start of the event (using the TiVo clock) at precisely 10:42.

In retrospect, the static on the television is very interesting. Our cable service is very reliable here and is not affected by the weather at all. Neither my sister nor I can ever recall seeing bursts of static since we've had this service (more than four years) and they are dramatic. Both are preserved on my TiVo.


Witness Two: On the evening of Friday, 5/21/04 I was in my bedroom reading. A very powerful thunderstorm had been right over our building for approximately ten minutes when my sister came into my room and asked me to come look at something. I glanced at the clock and noted that it was 10:46PM. She asked me to look out the window in her bedroom at the sky over Rock Creek Park. I saw at different times 1, 2, 3, or 4 blurry, yet distinct white lights moving counterclockwise in an apparent oval shaped orbit. The cloud cover was heavy, but my perception was that the lights were within or circling one particular cloud. The lightning was intense and lit up the entire sky several times as we watched the lights. The lights moved constantly in an erratic, jerky fashion, seemingly unaffected by the lightning. Their movement appeared ghostly to me and I thought of Casper cartoons. Their shape is harder to describe. Narrow at the bottom and wider at the top is close – almost torch-like with indistinct edges. It was my impression that their blurry, undefined appearance was due to the cloud cover and extremely hazy skies. After about ten minutes the intensity of brightness dimmed and I realized that only one light was still visible as it gradually disappeared. The storm raged on for another few minutes. My sister and I talked for a minute or two and I went back to my room at approximately 11:00PM.

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